Stephen F. Austin
22-2, 9-0Southland
New Orleans
10-15, 4-6Southland
Evans and Xariah Williams Step Up, Lead Ladyjacks to 3-1 Win over New Orleans
10/18/2018 8:41:00 PM | Women's Volleyball
SFA pushes nation's second-longest active winning streak to 19 matches
NACOGDOCHES, Texas - Usually a phrase to describe the hottest, longest days of summer, the dog days has a different meaning when applied to volleyball. For that particular sport - at least in the mind of SFA head coach Debbie Humphreys - they describe the month of October.
It is through those long, drawn-out day when volleyball teams around the country have to dig deep and balance the pressure of academics, travel and volleyball in order to achieve their goals. Thursday night inside Shelton Gym and after returning home from a mentally and physically exhausting road trip to Conway, Ark., a number of SFA's usual suspects were not their usual sharp selves, so the Ladyjacks once again used their depth to survive and remain undefeated in Southland Conference play.
Against New Orleans, the Ladyjacks' depth was personified in junior outside hitters Corin Evans and Xariah Williams who SFA used throughout the final two sets to dispatch an upset-minded New Orleans squad by a 3-1 score.
SET ONE | SFA 25, New Orleans 20
• Showing no early signs of fatigue, SFA charged out of the gates on a 14-6 run that featured kills from Ann Hollas, Peyton Redmond and Anyia Williams to stun the visiting Privateers.
• That fast start allowed the home team - who was playing in Shelton Gym for the first time in over three weeks - to withstand a strong push by the Privateers who countered the Ladyjacks' opening run with a 9-4 one.
• Consecutive terminations from Anyia Williams, Danae Daron and Hollas represented the entirety of a 3-0 run by the home team that pushed its lead to 21-15 over the Privateers.
• Two of the Privateers four blocks in the opening set came in the closing stages of the frame and helped the visitors trim SFA's lead to 24-20, but senior Haley Coleman finished things off with the second of her two terminations on the night before sitting out the remainder of the match.
SET TWO | New Orleans 25, SFA 18
• For only the fifth time in 2018, SFA dropped the second set as a result of eight unforced attack and service errors as well as four more blocks by the Privateers.
• The only lead the home team enjoyed in the set was when Redmond's service ace made matters 2-1. From there, New Orleans embarked on a 12-4 run that was capped off by four consecutive points to take a 13-6 lead.
• The Privateers' lead bulged to as many as eight points (16-8), before Daron began a 5-0 run by the Ladyjacks with a termination. That surge cut New Orleans' lead to 16-13 but the Ladyjacks got no closer for the remainder of the set.
• Kyra Hunter slammed home a pair of kills and added one of her four block assists during a 4-0 run by New Orleans that pushed the visitors in front 23-16. Two of the Ladyjacks' five service errors in the match represented the last two points New Orleans needed to take the frame and knot matters at one.
• Neither team hit above .100 in the set, but SFA's attack was bogged down considerably. The Ladyjacks hit only .024 in the frame, generating a scant nine kills.
SET THREE | SFA 25, New Orleans 18
• With a starting lineup of Makenzee Hanna, Daron, Hollas, Xariah Williams, Anyia Williams, Evans and Sabrina Monaco out on the floor, SFA's corner had a decidedly different look than fans had been used to, but it did anything but limit the effectiveness of one of the nation's best teams.
• Hanna and Evans punched down kills during the home team's 4-2 run to begin the frame, but the Privateers stayed within striking distance and used terminations from Blessing Dunn and Kaitlyn Grice during a 4-1 run to take a 12-11 lead.
• The visitors remained ahead until Hollas and Anyia Williams teamed up for a block that put SFA up 15-14. Though New Orleans won the next point, the Ladyjacks captured the next two and never trailed again.
• Following a Privateers timeout, SFA began to string together points on the serve of Hollas. Evans started a 6-0 SFA run with another kill while Hollas added an ace during it to help extend the Ladyjacks' lead to 23-16.
• Evans and Xariah Williams struck for kills during the Ladyjacks' final two points and put the home team ahead. SFA hit .281 in the frame - a match-high - while the Privateers peaked as well, hitting .207.
SET FOUR | SFA 25, New Orleans 17
• With victory in sight, the Ladyjacks kept feeding Evans and Xariah Williams who totaled two kills apiece in the team's 10-5 run to begin the final frame.
• Though New Orleans did manage to close within one, 12-11, Xariah Williams, Evans and Hollas shot in kills out of an SFA timeout to kick-start an 8-3 run which put the home team up 20-14.
• An unforced error by the Privateers and terminations from three different players represented the large part of a 5-2 run that clinched things for the home team.
KEY PERFORMERS/STATISTICS OF NOTE
• No Ladyjack finished with over nine terminations, but the balance exhibited by the home team on offense won the day. Hollas, Evans and Xariah Williams tied for match-high honors with nine kills apiece.
• Hollas finished one kill shy of her second triple-double of the year. The junior also posted 24 assists and 14 digs to settle with her eighth double-double of 2018.
• Joining Hollas in double-double territory was senior setter McKenzie Brewer. She finished with 23 assists and 10 digs while also putting in one kill.
• Anyia Williams led SFA's front-row defensive effort by finishing with five blocks while Hanna added four of her own. Daron accumulated eight kills and to go along with three rejections and a service ace.
• For the Privateers' part, the loss could not be blamed on their front-row defense. New Orleans amassed 14 total rejections, a match-high seven of which came courtesy of Grice, and held SFA to an attack percentage of .171 in the battle. New Orleans out-blocked the Ladyjacks 14-8 in a matchup of two of the best blocking squads in the nation.
• Dunn finished with a double-double consisting of 11 kills and 15 assists while Brianna Vega added eight terminations an ace and a pair of block assists.
• Hunter had nine kills and Grice seven for the Privateers in their sixth-straight setback.
• The win was SFA's 10th in a row over the Privateers and pushed the Ladyjacks' winning streak to 19 matches. That winning streak stands as the second-longest in the nation behind only Pittsburgh (20 straight wins, 20-0).
• SFA pushed its win total to a nation-leading 22 matches, too, and also extended its home court winning streak to 12 matches with the hard-fought victory.
QUOTABLE
SFA head coach Debbie Humphreys on the fatigue level and the play of Evans and Xariah Williams | "I expected some lull from some individuals tonight to be honest. We gave a lot of physical and mental effort on Tuesday night and just the amount of traveling that we've been doing has taken its toll on us. This is the first time we've been home in the month of October and right now we're a little more tired that we're used to being. There was a chance we'd be a little flat tonight, but I didn't know we'd be that flat so that we couldn't mentally execute the game plan. Fortunately we had fresh legs in Xariah and Corin and they're two very capable volleyball players. That's why they're on this team. They stepped up and showed why they're a part of this program tonight."
…on some second set troubles | "The second set was all about our own unforced errors. We couldn't get the ball anywhere we needed to get it in order to execute. When you can't get into a rhythm, you start trying too hard and when you do that it just leads to more errors. From there we went to some fresh legs to see if that would help us out and it did."
…on what makes New Orleans such a strong blocking team | "If you're out of system like we were a lot of the time tonight, you're going to struggle against a good blocking team. Usually we're more in system so we're getting some more splits in the blocks and taking advantage there. It wasn't until we were able to start running our middles in the third set that we were able to get our pins open on the outside. It's kind of a cat-and-mouse game, but until we execute on our own side there's no cat-and-mouse to be played."
COMING UP NEXT
• Saturday afternoon, SFA plays its final home match in the month of October by welcoming Louisiana and Southland Conference adversary Nicholls into Shelton Gym. Things between the Ladyjacks and Colonels get going at 1:00 p.m. as SFA goes gunning for its 20th-consecutive victory in front of a nationwide audience on ESPN+ and the ESPN app. Greg Miller and Brittany Castledine will be on the call.
-SFA-
